Bread

Bread is one of the most basic foods we eat and is a  symbol of many different ideas.  

When Asagi christens Beneatha as "Alaiyo" or "one for whom bread – food – is not enough", it is truly an apt description of her character. Bread used to be the staple food in the diets of ancient civilizations and because of this bread can be interpreted as a symbol of substance or life. So, Asagi essentially describes Beneatha as someone for whom life by itself is not satisfying enough. This is true because she is always questioning her surroundings, and she constantly changes from hobby to hobby such as horseback riding, acting lessons, and guitar lessons. This shows Asagi's high opinion of her because he believes that she is an intellectual person just like him and this is why he is attracted to her. Her journey of fulfillment and self-expression is mocked by others in the family, but she still wants to broaden her mind.  

In the Bible, bread is also used to symbolize a financial investment. This correlates to Walter because he wants to invest in a liquor store that he believes will bring money to the family. The other side of Beneatha's nickname is that it also applies to Walter because he is also not satisfied by his life and he wants to be more successful. For both of them, their bread is their way of life or the ghetto. Since they are both not satisfied with this, they want to use the check to escape their current lives and to explore the world further. Thus, the nickname given by Asagi shows how Walter and Beneath are simply two sides of the same coin.  

Eggs

I come in many different shapes and sizes: hard-boiled, sunny side up, scrambled, and poached are just a few.  

Although I am just a food, I am a symbol of  new life and the cyclic nature of humanity. I am also a symbol of fertility as people used to eat me to ensure that they would be blessed with children. To many, I have a religious significance because I am painted during Easter in order to symbolize the emergence of Jesus. My yolk represents inner beauty and the light people contain on the inside.  

When Ruth tells Walter to "eat his eggs", he gets upset because he believes that she is preventing him from accomplishing his dreams. This is very ironic because Walter is preventing Beneatha from accomplishing her dreams of becoming  doctor by taking the check. Not only does he do this, but also he implies her dream is not achievable because she is a woman by saying "ain't many girls who decide to be a doctor." Since the eggs symbolize new life and doctors are the protectors of life, he hates to see his American Dream deferred in favor of Beneatha's.  He is against eating the eggs because it means that he would  have to accept the way his life is and that he wouldn't be able to change it. Also, gender roles are enforced because Ruth is the one who is cooking while Walter laments his situation. Since eggs show female fertility, Ruth is expected to show Walter that she has eggs because women only had worth once they had proved that they could have children. Eventually, this results in Ruth's pregnancy and her desire to have an abortion.  

Pastry Pigs and Turkeys

"On buffet tables, garnished with glistening hors d'oeuvre, spiced baked hams crowded against salads of harlequin designs and pastry pigs and turkeys bewitched to a dark gold" (Fitzgerald 40). 

In Gatsby's parties his wealth is always ostentatiously displayed, and this instance is no exception. Hors d'oeuvre are typically served for very rich people, and in Gatsby's parties they are also glistening.

Also, the hams are crowded which shows Gatsby's tendency to always strive for the maximum quantity and not settle. The fact that the salads have a harlequin design shows how the salads are more for show than they are for actual eating; thus, Fitzgerald reveals how one of the central ideas of the 1920's was style over substance. Additionally, the turkeys were bewitched to a dark gold which creates an image of the turkeys having a spell cast upon them by a witch who turned them gold. It almost elevates the status of the turkey just because it has reached this magnificent gold color. The word bewitched suggests that the turkeys reached that color unnaturally, which is similar to the illegal way in which Gatsby came into his fortune.

This sentence is a hyperbole because no one actually has this kind of opulence at parties, and Fitzgerald is mocking Americans for believing that wealth will solve their problems. Despite this being a hyperbole, people completely ignore Fitzgerald's mocking tone and attempt to live the lavish lifestyle of Gatsby by throwing Gatsby-themed parties because they are so obsessed with the lifestyle of the twenties. This ignorance shows humanity's propensity to emulate the rich despite Fitzgerald trying to show us the superficiality of Gatsby's life.  

Caviar

How much do you make? What kind of car do you own? How big is your house? These questions paint a picture of one of the most important qualities in modern society. Status. Status alone can determine several aspects of our lives, such as where we study, the people we know, and the food we eat.  

Since I am caviar, this social hierarchy is very visible to me.

I am seen as a symbol of wealth because only the rich have the privilege of enjoying me. However, even among caviar there is a hierarchy; Almas caviar is more expensive than American caviar. Thus, a hierarchy breeds more hierarchies. For instance, if I have a mansion, there most likely will be someone else with a superior mansion. Despite my wealth, I will be saddened at the fact that what I have is not the best and I will desire the mobility to move upwards and have a better mansion. This proves humanity's desire to constantly have more and never be satisfied and reveals that "all they think of is money." This mentality leads to those at the top of the scale not being able to relate to those below them. All of us are supposed to created equal (s/o to Neil Garg), yet we are not. The environment in which we are born in can shape the rest of our lives. Some may argue that despite where we are born, our destiny is entirely in our hands. However, this is not true because there are so many factors that we do not have control over, such as the education available in the area or the presence of community leaders. Status by definition is a social construct because it depends on the status of those around you. The class divides that exist among both humans and food must be decreased if we are to have an equal society.  

An Ugly Tomato

We don’t always get what we want. This is a sad truth to life that is often realized too late. However, we cannot be punished for what we do not have, especially when it comes at no fault of our own. Yet, society often finds a way to punish those non-conformists who do not strive to achieve the “ideal” quality.

Every year, “6 billion pounds of perfectly edible produce is wasted every year” (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/05/19/food-waste-ugly-fruits-and-vegs-dont-judge_n_7309432.html) only because that produce is deemed ugly. As an ugly tomato, this greatly saddens me to know that so many of my brothers and sisters are being thrown away simply because someone can’t bear to look at them. 

Me

In fact, many of these fruits are still perfectly good on the inside but no one wants then simply because of their exterior. If you think about it, the way that produce is bought is so messed up. Fruit is only judged by the brightness of its color and its shape. Consumers don’t care about what is inside, when in reality, that is the only part that truly matters in terms of flavor. Also, some fruits have access to good sprays that makes them look shinier and hormones that make them fuller in shape. So, the status of a fruit directly affects its perceived beauty. How can fruit be judged based on its outside appearance when something so dependent on luck as status is can have consequences on it?  The fact that we are even called waste is psychologically threatening as “our waste” is “dumped” on the grounds of society (205). All we are seen as is a waste of space and a mistake or an imperfection in the system.  Humanity is so hypocritical; you preach that beauty standards are detrimental to society, yet you force the same upon fruits. So, I urge you, the next time you are in a store please buy an "ugly" fruit and maybe it’ll turn out to be the best one you’ve ever had.

Ramen Lives Matter

I’m tired of ramen getting a bad rep. Everyone thinks that we can’t be like caviar, or that we can’t be the most glamorous meal out there. It’s disappointing that whenever someone looks at ramen, they automatically assume that a college student on a low-budget is eating it; they assume we are a food made for poor people. Also, our native Japanese culture has disappeared as America has created “instant ramen.” Apparently, eating too much of us can cause disease. According to many, we are a poor among the rich variety of foods that exist today. Have you ever seen ramen as a gourmet food or portrayed as something to be appreciated? No.

Everyone thinks of this when ramen is mentioned:

Although, we can look like this:

We need to be metacognitive and recognize that the way we think about ramen is messed up. That last picture is probably surprising because you’ve never seen gourmet ramen in your life before. How strange is it that such a main food is not usually seen on the cover of major food magazines? All that people see is the most delicate Italian pasta or the perfect salad. Imagine how that makes all of the little ramen feel. They grow up with no hope because they have never seen anyone that looks like them ascend to food stardom. Many of my friends “believed that they were ugly”(38) or that they weren’t good enough. This is a sad reality of the way life works and it needs to be changed. We must realize that ramen can be appreciated for its value, ramen can be powerful, and ramen must be listened to if we do not wish to alienate a large member of food society.

The Bluest Cheese

As a piece of blue cheese and a member of food society, I always appreciate it when authors incorporate food in interesting or important ways in their novels.

Blue Cheese

An excellent example of this is The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison. Often times, she uses food to describe situations or objects where one would not expect it. For example, she compares love to “Alaga syrup” and mentions how she could “taste it.”

Because syrup is sweet, she is trying to explain how the love shown to her by her mother is very sweet. However, because syrup is unhealthy, she makes a larger point about love and how it has the capacity to be harmful. Another example of this is when she describes Maureen Peal as having “fluffy sweaters the color of lemon drops.” Instead of just saying yellow to describe her sweaters, Morrison uses lemon drops to create an image of manufactured and false brightness.

This shows how Maureen is a false person and is someone who cannot be trusted. Also, Maureen Peal is nicknamed Meringue Pie by Frieda and Claudia which is another example of food.Meringue Pie is a white food with fluff on the top which represents the whiteness of Maureen and her dislike of darker people.

Another example of her use of food is the ice cream incident involving Maureen, Pecola, Frieda, and Claudia. When the four of them are walking Maureen pulls out a “multifolded dollar bill” in order to buy ice cream. However, Frieda and Claudia don’t have money to buy their own ice cream. This reveals the large class difference between whites and blacks and how it affects the girls in their everyday lives. She also shows Pecola’s dependence on Maureen to buy her ice cream which symbolizes the dependence of blacks on whites and how blacks were not able to accomplish anything without whites being involved. Another use of food is when Pecola buys “Mary Janes” from the store owned by Mr. Yacobowski. 

This incident reveals racial tensions because Mr. Yacobowski is afraid to even touch Pecola’s hands because she is a black girl. The only reason he ends up touching them is because he gets money out of it. Because of Pecola’s humiliation, she leaves feeling ugly and unwanted in society. The use of food in this novel is very carefully done and the audience should pay attention to it in order to extract deeper meaning. 

A Barbie Doughnut

After Barbie and Ken left the bakery set, I was left all alone to think about my depressed doughnut life. 

I was so sad because recently I had been told by a doughman that he wouldn’t want to doughmate with me because my doughnut hole was too big. This is so stupid because once upon a time every doughman wanted a doughwoman who had a large hole; however in today’s doughsociety everyone thinks “small” holes are “king.” It’s almost as if he wanted a bagel instead of a doughnut. The beauty standards I am supposed to adhere to are strange simply because they expect me to be something that I am not. In my daily life, the laundry list of things I have to do in the morning to look “presentable” is ridiculous: put on my pink frosting, wear my pink sprinkles, and freshen my glaze.

The only reason I have to do this is to satisfy doughsociety’s standards of beauty. The rhetoric that the doughmedia is spreading about our bodies does not help either. We must always look our best or we will never be appreciated. Somehow doughJesus decreed that we must all have the perfect circular shape or we will never doughmate. 

Jesus enjoying my ancestor

Even in my childhood, everything I had was always pink and geared to me being a homemaker. My parents gave me pink elephant toys and pink kitchen sets expecting that I would care for their grandchildren while my husband worked at his job. I hope that in the future these gender roles and unfair beauty standards will not be imposed upon us doughwomen. Doughsociety needs to change dramatically in order to have progress. 

A Lonely Asiago Bagel

Once Vladek left to go talk to Art, I sat there alone in the study and began contemplating the Holocaust and everything that is wrong with it. 

Best Served with Jalapeño Cream Cheese

There is a certain crude irony to the Holocaust which no one else seemed to observe. For example, despite the fact that Hitler perpetuates the glory of the Aryan race and despises the Jewish people, he is not even a member of the Aryan race. In fact, he has Jewish ancestors including his father. Also, at the gates of many concentration camps is written “Arbeit Macht Frei”, which in German means “Work sets you free.”

This is an awful lie told by the Germans, because once the Jews were in the concentration camps, they were as good as dead no matter how much they worked. However, this lie is truly ironic because the freedom the Jews received was not freedom in the traditional sense, rather the freedom from life, or death. Also, after many Jews were freed by the Americans, they were given food to eat. However, this food killed them because their digestive systems were not used to proper nutrition. Literally, those who were their saviors simultaneously killed many of them. Another example of irony is Vladek’s racism, especially toward African-Americans. It seems ridiculous for Vladek to “talk about blacks the way the Nazis talked about the Jews” (99 VII) when he has experienced the full effects of racism at the hands of the Nazis. This shows that racial beliefs are so ingrained in human minds and they are very difficult to change even with enormous personal experience to the contrary. This almost comical yet tragic irony in the Holocaust is seldom discussed because it is taboo. However, it must be talked about in order to teach morality and the ramifications of racism. 

A Basket of Veggies

Fred was passed out on the ground and drooling in deep slumber as he probably dreamt about rocks, sticks, and other caveman things. I was resting in my basket as I listened to his deep breathing and thought about how I was stuck in a society full of idiots and yet somehow these idiots managed to keep eating me.

Fred himself has to keep saying yabba-dabba-doo over and over like a baby. 

His wife, Wilma is the most irresponsible woman ever and their daughter is the most mischievous little girl I’ve ever met. How am I expected to function when I am surrounded by these intellectually inept people who cannot possibly understand the thoughts I am able to verbalize? Eventually, Fred woke up and began to stumble around the cave like an oaf when he picked up a stick and started to scratch one of the walls with it. At first, I thought he was just making some noise to keep himself entertained, but then I saw that he was creating art. He had drawn a picture of him and his family in their home which was something I had never expected him to be capable of. 

Not only was his art nice to look at, it also created a sense of emotion in the viewer that I wouldn’t have thought he could understand. Looking at that picture, I felt a sense of contentedness and community that I would not be able to verbalize. I then realized that “a huge range of human experiences can be portrayed … through either words or pictures” (McCloud 152). Despite what I thought, Fred was actually a smart man and I should not have looked down upon him for only being able to express his thoughts through pictures. Just because pictures are seen as childish, they are not a lower form of communication; in fact, they contain a plethora of emotions. The perception that in order to be intellectual, an idea itself needs to be hard to comprehend is very wrong. In fact, the opposite is true, the most intellectual ideas are those that can be understood simply and contain deep thought. 

An Apple in the Fruit Bowl of Life

Before the Fruit Party:

I have so much to do today. I have to go to my stem-trimming appointment, I have to get my skin shined, I have to clean my worms out, and I have to get my leaves looking their best. 

Today is my big day. It’s the annual fruit party where all the fruit in the bowl come together and have one of the greatest evenings ever. Tonight, I’m going to dance with Miss Pear (hopefully), who is the most amazing fruit on the planet because she’s the captain of the Fruitennis team, an expert on nuclear fruition, and the most beautiful fruit in the world. Even if it’s only for one song, that’s okay, I just have to dance with her.  

After the Fruit Party:

I’m home and I’m tired and dejected. I didn’t get to dance with Miss Pear. Instead, Mr. Avocado got to dance with her. Just because he has one stupid tattoo, suddenly all the fruits love him.

I’m just as good as him, yet no one seems to see that. Hm, maybe Miss Pear is just too good for me, and I shouldn’t expect her to dance with me, I guess it’s her decision to dance with who she wants Maybe Mr. Banana, Mr. Orange, and Mr. Kiwi wanted to dance with Miss Pear and they are feeling the same way I do. Maybe Mr. Avocado didn't intend to hurt me and I shouldn't be mad at him. Maybe there was some fruit out there who wanted to dance with me but because I was so focused on my goal of getting Ms. Pear to dance with me, I didn’t notice her. These outcomes may be unlikely, but they are definitely “not impossible” (Wallace).  All of us, as a fruit population must learn to not think about ourselves and instead think about those around us as well. I can’t only think about myself with regards to this party, I need to consider the feelings of others involved. This “natural, basic self-centeredness” is so “repulsive” although “it’s pretty much the same for all of us” (Wallace).  After all, aren't we all just apples in the fruit bowl of life?

A Bag of Popcorn

I was hanging out in front of the TV in Amer Zahr’s house watching the news with him and his friends

 I was the finest bag of Orville Redenbacher popcorn and CNN had breaking news. 

This breaking news, as it often does, involved terrorism, and this terrorism had to somehow involve Arabs. 

This may just seem like a standard occurrence to you, but as a bag of popcorn observing society, I find this quality truly unique. For instance, if somehow I land up next to a piece of white popcorn even though I’m a piece of yellow popcorn we can still get along just fine, because in the end, we are both pieces of popcorn. For humans on the other hand, once one terrorist organization has been established by radial Islamists, suddenly every other act of terrorism has to be caused by them. As Amer said himself, “we are able to be in news stories even when news stories have absolutely nothing to do with us.” I think this ability to invent hate where there is none to be found is sickening. It is disgraceful that an Arab man going to an airport has to make sure that he trimmed his beard the night before. It is awful that one of the most consequential presidents in American history can only be remembered by some for his middle name being Hussein. As just a mere bag of popcorn quietly watching your society, I can see these problems so why can’t your government? There is a clear racial divide in this country that needs to be healed. Although this mission towards progress may seem daunting, it must begin somewhere. As Lao Tzu said, "a journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step." 

A Tasty Slice of Buffalo

          I was lying on a table pretty relaxed when suddenly I heard the chief stumble in. Uh-oh. I knew it was about time for me to be cut up and eaten by all the members of the tribe. I was a tasty slice of buffalo and I was on the menu.

                 

          First, as always, the tribe leaders began playing one of their gambling games which meant they all needed their large amounts of alcohol. I decided to tune out their broken and slurred English because how could they possibly have anything important to say. After I became bored, I decided to start paying attention to their conversation. They were mentioning something about a pipeline and how the government was trying to build it across their lands and ruin the water supply. I thought about my poor buffalo brothers and sisters who would be displaced by this atrocity and I was so mad at the American government for doing this to us. How could I be proud of the country that I’ve been roaming since I was a baby bison, how could I be a patriot when the rights of my own people were being trampled upon. How could this country, the “land of the free, home of the brave” (Vowell) take away my most precious right? Wait. Imagine how the Native Americans feel about this. I’ve been brainwashed by this country into thinking that all Native Americans are drinkers, gamblers, and uneducated. These stereotypes have been so ingrained in my head that I didn’t stop to question whether or not they are true.  I didn’t even stop to consider their feelings about the pipeline and instead I only jumped to my own. The white man who oppresses the Indians is in a way exactly like me. He would never think about them and instead only think about himself. And if what they say is true,

            Are we all equal?

Just a Piece of Cheese

There I was, just a piece of cheese, sitting in Elizabeth Cady Stanton’s pantry hoping that I could stay alive for a few more days. 

Then I heard her talking about something that she needed to write. She was drafting a document that she called the Declaration of Sentiments, which I as a lonely piece of cheese, had no idea about. As I heard her discussing this document, I started to realize why she was writing it and what she was hoping to accomplish.

She wanted to write this document in order to gain equality for men and women, and specifically earn women the right to vote in elections. However, most men did not agree with this idea and the people who had the power to change this societal injustice were all men. Still, Stanton wanted to spark a revolution that she hoped would one day bring about legislative change.

One part of the document is a list of grievances suffered by women at the hands of men. This part states things such as “He has never permitted her to exercise her inalienable rights to the elective franchise.” This is an interesting decision because she does not list the grievances generally, but rather in a very specific manner. The purpose of this was to make women seem like objects that were suffering at the tyranny of men just like the white male colonists were suffering at the tyranny of King George.

Also, one of the things she wanted to include in her document was a specific list of things that women wanted in order to be equal. However, eventually she reached the same conclusion I did which was that this list of specific wants was not necessary and in fact might hurt their cause in the future. I realized that if she only said that women want the right to vote and nothing else, then they might not get anything else in the future. This decision shows that language does not only have the power to influence and change society but it also has the power to limit in a profound way. Thus, no matter how inclusive an author intends to be, some group is always excluded because the language itself that the author uses is limiting.